I prefer to talk about the gift of literature rather than its role or task.
No one ever comitted suicide while reading a good book, but many have tried while trying to write one.
I'm a fan of Bill Hicks. He did things that no other stand up did at the time. He was making fun of religion, at that time it was a lot harder to say those things in the States than it was here. To slag off Christianity and fundamentalist Christians, and to be pro drugs and anti gun in the deep south, that's a big ask. And he did that and made it funny. Bill Hicks was able to say things that he really thought, and he managed to make those thoughts funny without a care if it antagonised people.
Ed, I see you're out drinking again. What's the occasion? I was sober.
I was thinking about New York and realized how much I hate walking around in the winter and how much I dread getting on the train.
A lot of times, good improv is when both people, or however many people are in the scene, really have no idea what the next thing you're going to say is.
I have come from France more firmly convinced than ever that Negros should write Negro music. We have our own racial feeling and if we try to copy whites we will make bad copies…We won France by playing music which was ours and not a pale imitation of others, and if we are to develop in America we must develop along our own lines.
Since the Creator had made the facts of the after-life inaccessible to man, He must not have required that man understand death in order to live fruitfully.